Der Newbie: Turn 8 I leik pockets

[Timotheus]

Das newbie fuhrer sets out to lose Barbarosa (aka lets all laugh at Timo's newbie antics and point out his mistakes)

Hello, mein freunde... especially big hello to any frauleins out there (fat chance with this game, LOL).

This will be a fun and casual AAR where I will play the mighty Slovakian-Hungarian-Romanian Axis as they invade the Soviet Union (wait, am I missing something here?...

...

...

Of course!! The Italians will join us soon, duh! [:'(]).

The emphasis will be on good natured yet weird and offbeat humor, and the aim will to entertain you with my inept play while (hopefully) you will be kind enough to point out any mistakes I have made/any way which I could have done better.

Comments and advice very much welcome.

Game is on normal, everything is 100/100, non random weather is checked, full fog of war is on, movement fow is on, STAVKA is AI controlled.

Aha, reduced blizzard effect is NOT CHECKED (start the panic now [:D]).


On with the show!

Turn 1

This is my 1st turn air doctrine. It worked so well that I left it like that for the rest of my game until, roughly, turn 17 where I put the % required to fly to 50.

[Timotheus]

Pressed the AI button to bomb airfields 3 times.

I think the results were OK.

[Timotheus]

AGN

I could never capture Riga. Ever. So advanced moves like naval transport of the L Corps (Polizei motorized plus an inf) is out.

On the other hand it is hard to mess this up TOO much - ports of Liepaja and Ventspils are mine, so no supply for you, STAVKA, in AGN.

Also got bridgeheads across the Daugava and Riga WILL fall next turn.

[Timotheus]

AGC

Big pocket north of Brest-Litovsk and the the Brest fortress is surrounded.

Our fast movers are motoring to Minsk.

Totally ignoring the swamps of Pripyet Marshes.

[Timotheus]

AGS

The historical (muahahahahahaaha) Lvov pocket.

As you can see this game is showing us that the Soviet Union was CLEARLY taking defensive positions on the border to repel the Axis attack and NOT in an offensive posture to do an offensive against Romania. That's why the best Soviet generals and divisions were on the Romanian border in 1941 - obviously defending Odessa was a much more important goal to STAVKA than, say, Smolensk and Moscow axis... you know, the traditional and cool way to invade Russia from the East (hey, worked so well for Nappy, he got into Moskva with no problems using horses, so we with our MkI and MkII panzers will have NO PROBLEMS).


So of course Suvorov, Pleshakow, Gerasimova, Edwards, Solonin et al are all wrong and the American "historians" who cannot see the forest for the trees and are pushing disproven dogmas are right. I really wish some of the new Russian historians got their books published in English to finally put the nail in the coffin of senile dorks like Glantz et al who are stuck defending their indefensible idiotic theories.

Rightie-o!

Back to the game.

Did not take Tarnopol and satisfied myself with a gigantic encirclement of troops on the eastern border.

Masses and masses of troops here, which actually make der fuhrer pee his pants a little (OK, OK - a LOT). Zooming out the map to the maximum does NOT help to make the house painter's mood improve... quite the opposite...


The directive for Barbarossa is as follows:
Destroy the enemy troops east of the Dnepr, this is a war of annihilation.

All geographic and strategic considerations are secondary - capture and destroy as much of the Red Army as we can.

Forwarts, marsch!

[Timotheus]

Turn 1 ends

Ground losses

There are reports of Soviet monster tanks which our anti-tank panzerjager guys have trouble fighting. In fact, our 37mm anti tank guns' shells just bounce off of them!

In fact, I have reports that a Soviet super heavy tank has basically rolled over our panzerjager AT guns and kept on going, scattering our landser who had no way to fight back.

Such defeatist talk must be quelled - I am sure it is just a few troops losing their nerve, as clearly Germany has the superior weapons systems and the backward "workers' paradise" could not produce such an advanced tank... besides, I am sure our Abwehr would have alerted me to this.

Yup, just a few soldiers losing their nerve and telling stories...

[Timotheus]

Turn 1 ends

Air losses (Soviets Air Force is obliterated due to airfield bombing and our units overrunning their airfields)

[Bamilus]

gl Ill be following this. About to start a GC myself. Might do an AAR, haven't decided.

[Timotheus]

None can point out how I can improve turn 1 nor any mistakes I have made? [:(]

This is the turn that I am sure the experts have played oh, I dunno, a gazillion times as the Axis, so any comments on this are VERY welcome.

Keep in mind that this is a newb AAR, which WILL be read by people who just bought the game (on sale) as well as folks undecided about this little-monster.

So you are not just helping me with my play, you will be helping THEM.

[jwolf]

I have only a very modest amount of experience myself and my only campaigns were against the AI. For what it's worth, here's my take on your first move.

North and Center: position is OK, a bit short of goals in the center, but what worries me is that the number of pocketed units is not all that great. It looks like you routed a lot of them away. Some of the routed units are still trapped, but many of them, I am guessing, safely retreated well behind the Russian lines.

Pripyat Marsh: Be careful here. I recommend using a few small or weak units to crawl through the swamps and sterilize them. If not, you can get burned by a Russian cav division that breaks into your rear areas.

South: I can't tell if you have officially pocketed the units near Lvov, but they are doomed for sure. I can't see Kovel a bit farther north and that is a key spot to trap a few units and then clear them out, in advance of a drive toward Rovno. Several of your panzer divisions will get cut off -- temporarily, to be sure, but their supply will be badly disrupted as a result. The south is surprisingly difficult compared to center and north: the Soviet units tend to be tougher, terrain is more difficult, and there is just an awful lot of ground to cover with not enough troops.

Be sure to have a clear plan for all 5 of your FBD units. They, not the panzers, are what will win the war.

Oh, BTW, it's der Fuhrer, not das. No wonder your troops suffered losses; your e-Hitler was sulking the whole time. [;)]

[Timotheus]

This is vs the AI, as the player (me) is definitely a noob and only started the game seriously a few days ago.

Thanks for the comments, jwolf!

"I can't see Kovel a bit farther north and that is a key spot to trap a few units and then clear them out, in advance of a drive toward Rovno."

Aha!

Guess I lucked out, as I just got a panzer unit to lock it down in a ZOC. It's the black dot 1NE hex off the 14-50 Red Panzer stack.




Good idea on not routing the enemy units but pocketing them, but I figured speed uber alles is the thing on turn 1.


BTW I am already in November 1941 in this game, and doing... OK-ish.... sorta, kinda... but the idea here in this noob AAR is to show me (and any other nooblet) what are my mistakes and what I could have done better per turn, so thanks again for the comments and wisdom.

I will treat this as a learning experience and as a preparation before I tackle a human being in multiplayer.


So, yes, routing too much and then, WORSE, touching the routed units so they routed AWAY from the pockets was a BIG mistake on my turn 1. Well spotted.


"a bit short of goals in the center".
I am all ears. I thought I did great in the Centre - where should my AGC guys be then? I did not want them to be TOO far away from support, but you are saying they should be farther east?

Please elaborate; thanks in advance.

" Several of your panzer divisions will get cut off -- temporarily, to be sure, but their supply will be badly disrupted as a result."

Naw, this is vs AI, although I can see how a human would sacrifice a few units to cutoff the panzer spearheads (which DID happen a LOT in the real Barbarossa, with panzer spearheads guys in tanks making an igla all around defense and hunkering down until resupply by either air or ground pounders reached them.

"Be sure to have a clear plan for all 5 of your FBD units. They, not the panzers, are what will win the war."

This right there.

I think the FBD rail repair guys are THE MOST IMPORTANT units the Axis player has. In fact, I will make a separate post/screen on them (good idea to highlight their importance).

I think I DID mess up the RR guys in my game, btw.

"The south is surprisingly difficult compared to center and north: the Soviet units tend to be tougher, terrain is more difficult, and there is just an awful lot of ground to cover with not enough troops".

The south has the best Soviet units due to their plans for Romania in 1941... the worst terrain has got to be up north by St Petey, though, no? The South is very problematic for the Axis as yes, it has a LOT of ground to cover AND you are doing it with Romanians, mainly (hmmm).

I am sure that I did mess up the pockets (alongside routing too many units on turn 1).

I had trouble in the north with Riga (I even tried save scumming and reloading, but I could NOT take Riga and decided to NOT save scum anymore to make it a more fun game).

Also, I am sure that the Lvov pocket could be much better - I have seen people take Tarnopol, which is a main railroad hub in the South, but there was so much opposition that I decided to take the easier route and bypass it.

[Timotheus]

Railroad units.

Total cluster****.

Only up north the guys are moving, in the centre and south they are stopped dead by Brest Litovsk and other border defenses.

AGN RR goes up north (of course) the 2 AGC guys are divided, one north of Pripyat, the other south of it... was the plan, but instead BOTH of them are up north! One going way up north...

The AGS RR guy is standing still, stopped dead by the border combat and not doing anything.

Like I said, der (heh) newbie furher is a total nooblet.

[Gabriel B.]

ORIGINAL: Timotheus

None can point out how I can improve turn 1 nor any mistakes I have made? [:(]

This is the turn that I am sure the experts have played oh, I dunno, a gazillion times as the Axis, so any comments on this are VERY welcome.

Keep in mind that this is a newb AAR, which WILL be read by people who just bought the game (on sale) as well as folks undecided about this little-monster.

So you are not just helping me with my play, you will be helping THEM.

Agn is ok ,except for riga. use 2 rail rapair units on one track initialy , spliting out in turn 3.


Agc, the armored unit turn behind Byalostock is a mistake, strike north toward Dvinsk instead.
the area between dvinsk and Minsk is lightly defended but you did not exploit it ( use at least two mot div from 3 PzAOK there ).
The 4 infantry divisions from 3 PzAOK must folow the armor ( fight at litle as posible with them and push east . )

9th AOK is keeping too much infantry to contain the northern part byalostock pocket , 3 divisions + 3 sec div is enough.


do not repair the track behind 2 PzAOK ( it cannot keep up with guderian advance ) .
use Vilnius as a suply source for 2 PzAOK not Brest.


More comennts later but for the time being , ags situation is realy bad.

[loki100]

not sure how the AI will respond but as a human player if you did that set of moves in the South I'd be able to tie you in knots trying to bring the situation under control.

good trick for learning some of the basics of T1-3 with the Germans is to do those turns left hand vs right hand. Since the Soviet moves are essentially re-active knowing your overall strategy doesn't matter but it'll give you a much better insight into the consequences of the German moves and potential reactions.

one niggle, Stavka is, in Russian, a proper word not an acronym like OKH. So its not capitalised. It sort of translates as tent and refers back the medieval Russian armies where the 'tent of the supreme commander' was marked by large flags so commanders and messangers knew where to go. The Tsar re-invented the title in 1915 so as to sustain the myth that he was braving the dangers of war at the front with his loyal subjects. Stalin recreated the title in 1941 for much the same reason (Stalin at the front was a common theme in Soviet propaganda and posters) and to build continuity so as to stress the patriotic rather than political nature of the war as a defence of Russia not of the Soviet state.

[BJP III]

One other thing relates to your Air Doctrine. I don't think there is any reason set keep your escort levels so low. You want to minimize your bomber losses, because as they lose a/c, they lose morale, and morale is important in determining whether a particular group will fly. Moreover, fighters seem to be able to fly a lot more missions than bombers for the same amount of fatigue, so you do not need to worry about them getting worn out before the bombers do.

[timmyab]

Hi. I hope you don't mind me posting a map in your AAR but as you were asking I thought it would be the easiest way to compare our first turns and where you should look to improve.
AGN is pretty good. Some people choose to rout out the Soviets here, I don't myself. The same with Riga. Some people try to take the city on turn one, I think it can be ignored. Both these things are debatable.
AGC needs some work. As Gabriel says, it's a mistake to turn 3rd pz group behind the Byalostok pocket, get it East as far as possible. You'll also notice that my infantry are further East. They've gained half a turn already. I leave one corps each from 4th and 9th armies plus sec divisions to clear the Byalostok pocket. Everything else heads east as fast as their legs will carry them.
Brest should either be assaulted turn one or bypassed.
AGS also needs a rethink, it's the most technically challenging part of turn one. Experienced players almost universally send the cavalry division from 24th pz corps to help form the Kovel pocket and most likely it's infantry divisions as well. Most players also send mobile units from 2nd pz group South to help out 1st pz group with it's difficult task. In this case I've sent two divisions and GD regiment from 46th pz corps South.
You should aim to cut off the Soviet units South of Rovno. Don't worry about panzers being isolated on turn one, they carry fuel with them for turn two. You'll need to split some divisions down to form a checkerboard.
Again my infantry have gained half a turn, clear a channel and get them heading East as fast as possible.

See threads on the forum for ideas about rail conversion.

Hope this helps. Obviously there are some technical hurdles to jump before you can get a good turn one, but hopefully this will give you an idea of what can be done.

[cpt flam]

and with this one, Rumania join war on turn 2

[Timotheus]

This is great stuff guys, especially the map posted... a picture is worth a thousand words... But everybody elses pointers were great also!

Like I said, I am a nooblet, and I could not even get Tarnopol in turn 1.

AGS is difficult for me (read - impossible) and I think that I left far too much stuff screening Brest Litovsk also.

I did not even consider stacking two RR FBD units together...


Great stuff, keep it going, soon I will post turn 2.

Now, turn 2 flows from the (not 100% optimized) turn 1 but since this is a war game with some luck involved, analyzing tactical situations as they are will help new people (like your truly) better understand the game and what to do/what to not do in a given turn/situation.

Also, Stavka - got it. And, err, "Der(p)" not "Das" [:D]

I think I will leave this for a bit more as Turn 1 is THE MOST IMPORTANT turn for the Axis in this game.

Don't worry, turn 2 will come where you can all be amazed at what NOT to do [;)]


Edit: When and how does Romania join the Axis? I looked in the US_LETTER manual but did not find out. Is there a variation when Romania joins the conflict (apparently it is NOT the same turn every game but has conditions which trigger it; news to me).

Edit 2: Thank You all.

[jwolf]

Normally the Rumanians, and also German 11th army, are activated on turn 3. But they can be set loose a turn early if the Germans link up with Rumanian territory from the north (that is, from Tarnopol to Chernovtsy). This will also unfreeze the Russians in that area as well (I think) but fair is fair.

[caliJP]

Timotheus, previous posts are all good, adding some more:
One general comment is that there are many many details in WITE that if you pay attention to, combined together will make a big difference to your army’s performance. You can’t really learn all of those at ones (at least I could not), so it’s good to play several games against the AI and each time incorporate more of those details that you find on the forum until you fine tune your technique enough. But of course eventually you have to play humans as the AI can only push you so far.

One specific comment: on T1 and next few early turns, one trick I use: I first look at units that are either behind the front line or on the front line with low MPs and I use those to blast the first line of soviet defenders. This means that my higher MP units seating on the front line now can exploit the breaches with maximum MPs. This is cheesy in a way that it takes advantage of the timeline mechanics of the game, but most wargames work that way.

One more specific to T1: I tend to only blast the front line at specific spots where I want to pierce with Panzers. I tend to depopulate the line to the bare minimum in other areas and use the moved units to do the initial blasting (use of technique described above). You only need to keep enough to keep the pocket sealed, which is easy on T1 since the soviet units are very weak. This means often that most or all units seating right on the frontline where I want to pierce have the soviet frontline cleared (either routed or at least out of forts) before they have spent a single MP. They can then way more easily exploit the breach. You don't want to route too many units on T1, better to pocket them. Only exception is I blast all the FZs I can so that the soviet doesn't get a chance to disband them and recycle the elements into other units.

OK one more: turn ON the hex shading that shows hexes that are under your control vs enemy control. This is very useful in figuring out whether your pockets can be broken or not. With some practice, you’ll get a good feel for the possible spacing between units and how many layers of hexes under your control are required to prevent the soviets from breaking the pocket. The left/right hand suggestion is good from that standpoint as it will show you what the soviets can and can’t do. Some rules of thumbs are: 2 hex between units will prevent any units going through as soviet units pretty much run out of MPs as soon as they hit a german ZOC. In free space in 1941, a soviet unit can typically only go 2 hex deep into enemy territory and convert the next hex via it’s ZOC, assuming it starts right at the border. So in some areas where you have gone deep enough, you can keep a pocket sealed with just converted hexes without using any units (careful with that trick, but with some practice you’ll figure it out), so you can use more units to go deeper in enemy territory. This is specially useful the first few 1941 turns when soviet units are sparse, harder to use later.

I hope this helps.